What Lorna Saw

Leper Queen

Summary

  Foster, apoplectic at the sight of Apocalypse, babbles obsessively about cricket. Apocalypse is more interested in why he was awakened: once a surge in mutants did it, now a sudden drop (see House of M LS). Foster asks if he's going to kill him; he says it's a possibility, but first he raises an arm, and energy swirls.

  Gazer tries to get the torso to talk again, but no good. He's decided if he's going to die, he'll do it in space, and he dons a space suit and jumps out: "Who knows what's waiting?"

  Daap babbles to Lorna, who thinks she understands it; Alex tries to get her away from the freakish thing, but Daap telekinetically pushes him away. Lorna insists it was her power being returned to her by Daap, and Alex can't get her to see reason. This is what she saw in space (iss. 170), and she's been waiting for this miracle. Suddenly in the distance a stone Sphinx with Apocalypse's face rises from the Costa Rican jungle.

  Nearby, the Leper Queen leads a gunman through the jungle and chats about daughter Lucia Page. He really doesn't want to hear it, but she needs to tell it sometimes: "like shedding skin." She looks at her daughter's picture in a locket; she swore to make every mutant pay for what she went through. When she was pregnant, she saw a mutant, and the child lurched within her, infected, lost. Still a baby, she generated sparks, then fires, then a conflagration that killed her and took the Leper Queen's face. She removes her mask to show the man, and following her code, she then kills him.

  Lorna knees Alex and runs to Daap, saying they need to listen to it. Daap blasts Alex again, hurting him; he insists it's "a revolting alien monster" that can't help Lorna and that she doesn't need; she asks if he thinks she needs him, instead, but he says he doesn't need anyone or her mutant powers. Before he can convince her, Daap blasts again, knocking him out. Lorna tells Daap to stop it, or she won't be its friend, but she admits she's smitten.

  Mystique arrives at the Institute with her protégé Pulse, who she says is a Robin Hood-y thief, deep and cultured and a perfect match for Rogue. Neither Remy nor Rogue take to that, but Mystique says the guy has hidden talents the X-Men can use. Remy insists she leave; Scott reminds him the X-Men voted her in (iss. 174), with probationary status. Mystique mocks Remy, promising not to seduce him again (see iss. 171-173), and Scott lets her stay.

  The Leper Queen lunges out of the jungle and attacks Lorna; now she needs Alex, and he blasts the Leper Queen and then Daap. Daap counters, and Alex goes down, but then Daap explodes to goo; a green light then grabs Lorna and the Leper Queen and lifts them skyward, while Alex stands there agog.

  Note: a Franklin Richards story follows.